Monday, 4 August 2014

PANEL-BY-PANEL - STEADFAST McSTAUNCH...

STEADFAST McSTAUNCH was originally a dog in KNOCK-OUT comic in the 1950s. In 1969, BOB PAYNTER, the editor of the embryonic WHIZZER & CHIPS, asked DENIS GIFFORD to revive the character - but as a human. "Children don't like animals in comics " Denis once claimed Bob had told him as the reason for the species-change, although that doesn't explain SLIPPY or GINGER'S TUM in the same comic.

I assume Bob must've meant only that kids weren't keen on strips with animals dressed as humans, otherwise MOWSER, DESERT FOX, MOOSE, The CROWS, and a host of other strips wouldn't have graced IPC/FLEETWAY periodicals for decades. However, let's not forget that GUS GORILLA dressed like a human and was quite popular with readers.

(And that's not counting characters like BIFFO The BEAR, KORKY The CAT, The 3 BEARS, BIG EGGO, and loads more in the best-selling D.C. THOMSON titles.)

Steadfast survived in his own strip for the first 11 issues of W&C, before becoming the host of a joke page, something I always regretted as the little jester was a firm favourite of mine. Anyway, here's the last strip from the pages of Whizzer & Chips #11, December 27th 1969.

UPDATE: And, thanks to young reader GEORGE SHIERS, here's the published page from W&C #11. Be sure to check out George's site devoted to the comic, here.

4 comments:

I never appreciated Denis Gifford's art style at all as a kid, in fct I disliked it - It was only when I saw some of his art in the "Ally Sloper" magazine (of the 70s) as a teenager that I took a second look, now I look out for his work at every opportunity - it reminds me in style and wackiness of Jay Wards word (Fractured Fairy Tales etc) that I watched as a kid looks even better here. For me his work looks modern and could slot into todays comics quite easily.

His style looks to have been influenced by Mad's Harvey Kurtzman, McScotty. If you look at some examples on the internet, you'll see the similarities. I think, had Denis spent just a little more time on his art, he'd be better remembered for it today, rather than just as a footnote in his career as a comics historian and collector.

STUDIO 77

About the artist:

From 1985 to 2000 A.D. (little joke there), I contributed to a variety of high profile comics and magazines for various companies.

For IPC/FLEETWAY/EGMONT, I freelanced as a lettering and logo artiston various weekly comics and monthly magazines, and also as a resize comic artistandspot illustratoron pocket books, summer specials and annuals.

ForMARVEL U.K., BLACK LIBRARY, REDAN and USBORNE BOOKS, I again freelanced as a lettering artist, also working as arestoration artistfor MARVEL U.S., restoring and re-creating certain pages of JACK KIRBY art for their MARVEL MASTERWORKS editions.

I also lettered the MARVELMAN sample pages submitted to MARVEL U.S. when they were considering acquiring the character, which - as we all now know - they DID.

Supplied comic strips, cartoons and illustrated advertisements for local business campaigns and newspaper publication on a professional basis since the age of 16. Did my first paid art job for publication at 14 or 15 for Lanarkshire Education Board.

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